South Korea is planning to launch its own climate monitoring satellite into a geostationary orbit by 2018 to conduct atmospheric environmental research over the Korean peninsula and north-east Asia.
South Korea’s National Institute of Environmental Research (NIER) will select a foreign firm in 2012 to further meet the planning requirements and to jointly develop of satellite.
An NIER official said: "Through the launch of the satellite, we expect that we can take the initiative in the discourse of climate change and strengthen our national image as a high-tech nation."
The geostationary satellite’s main body and a ground station will be developed by Seoul for its planned launch in 2015.
With a ten year lifespan, the satellite will examine pollutants during the daytime, which include Ozone, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and formaldehyde.
Following the discussion of satellite related issues with the US and European experts, the country has also selected certain standards on the satellite’s size and capabilities in proportion to the international standards.
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By GlobalDataEurope and the US, planning to launch geostationary satellites in 2019 and 2020 respectively, are currently operating low-earth orbit (LEO) satellites to monitor changes in climate and other atmospheric aspects.
A geostationary orbit satellite, revolving at nearly 35,800km above the Earth’s equator, will follow the direction of the Earth’s rotation; while a geostationary satellite, placed at a fixed position above the Earth’s surface, will facilitate to focus on specific areas.
Due to technical complexities, the development and launch of a geostationary satellite will be a costly affair over a LEO satellite that floats nearly 160km-2,000km above the earth’s surface.
An LEO satellite, due to be a closer distance from earth than the geostationary satellite, takes reduced transmission time while consuming less energy.
South Korea has already launched its third multi-purpose Arirang-3 satellite in Japan this month, which will provide geographical information about the Earth.
